This biography is republished from The Dictionary of Irish Biography and was written by Helen Andrews. Shared by permission in line with Creative Commons ‘Attribution’ (CC BY) licencing.
Born: Unknown, Ireland (assumed)
Died: 1792
Country most active: Ireland
Also known as: Sarah Stringer
Cotter, Sarah (fl. 1751–92), printer and bookseller, was possibly the sister of Joseph Cotter (d. c.1751), a bookseller operating from under Dick’s Coffee House, Skinner Row, Dublin (1744–c.1751). She continued the trade at the same address (1751–74) and was admitted to the guild of St Luke the Evangelist as a quarter-brother in 1756 – an unusual distinction for women, who were denied full freedom – and paid quarterage until 1770.
With considerable astuteness, she recognised the needs of the market and was one of the first to specialise in the publication of legal works – an enterprise which she undertook with others, as in the publication of Sir John Strange’s Reports of adjudged cases in the courts of Chancery (1756) with Oliver Nelson and Richard Watts (fl. 1745–62). She became a considerable law publisher and bookseller, published a Sale catalogue of law books for 1766, and frequently advertised her publications in various newspapers, including the Dublin Journal and Freeman’s Journal. She established a link with the trade in London, imported books, and appeared in London imprints as the Dublin agent.
She published Poems by eminent ladies (1757), Shakespeare’s Measure for measure (1761), Edmund Burke’s Philosophical enquiry (4th ed. 1766), and (as advertised in the Freeman’s Journal, 9 May 1767) ‘beautifully printed on a fine writing paper’ A collection of apothegms and maxims for the conduct of life by G. E. Howard (1767). After her marriage (1768) to Joseph Stringer (fl. 1754–83), a Dublin painter-stainer, she traded under her married name and in that year printed the play The wonder! or a woman keeps a secret by the Irishwoman, Susannah Centlivre (c.1667–1723). From 1768 her husband and her former apprentice Charles Ingham (fl. 1747–92) managed the business, though Sarah only retired officially in 1774.
On 21 September 1784 she wrote from Summerhill, Dublin, to the Rev. Philip Skelton, praised his book An appeal to commonsense on the subject of Christianity, and, to promote his ideas, offered and duly paid for a cheaper edition to ensure a wider circulation. She later received his permission to have his portrait drawn, given on the condition that no copy would be made and that she would destroy the portrait before she died, which she duly did three months before her death in March 1792. Her will was proved in the Dublin prerogative court (1792). Her books are included in A catalogue of the Bradshaw collection of Irish books in the University of Cambridge 1602–1882 (1916).